Climbing Photography By Ben Herndon

Capturing that moment, photographer Ben Herndon told National Geographic, "For this shot the real challenge was the constant dripping water from the icicles on the cave ceiling above. And there was the small possibility of Craig skewering me with his crampons. I decided to move directly underneath Craig. The trick was to time the shot when he was looking down to find feet placement, so you end up with this sprawling profile on top of the intense eyes."
A few years ago, Herndon decided to start shooting rock climbing with his friend Craig Pope, another Moscow, Idaho local, when we came upon this sport called ice climbing. "He had started killing it on ice and it seemed like a beautiful and dynamic form of climbing," Herndon explains. "He dragged me along to Banks Lake in central Washington state during a balmy 5 degree day. It was actually kind of a traumatic first time experience. I was fumbling with all of my photo and climbing gear as I approached our first ice route when a limo-sized ice formation detached on a climb above us. We couldn't see it fall so all I heard was this enormous crash and then two-hundred pound ice blocks came rapidly pachinko-ing down the hillside at me.
"Craig, who stood safely behind a cliff ahead of me said calmly, 'You might want to run.' And I did. I was very much concerned for my safety. I actually dropped all of my camera gear and sprinted for a tree nearby stand. That's the photographer's equivalent of hucking your new born in front of an oncoming bus. I felt bad about it afterward. Needless to say, I was a little nervous about climbing that day. But events like that are pretty rare and actually haven't happened to me since."